


Here is our paradise

by kate_the_reader



Series: His sun [7]
Category: Good Omens (TV)
Genre: (a bit), (mostly), Aziraphale's books, Established Relationship, Fluff, M/M, POV Aziraphale (Good Omens), POV Crowley (Good Omens), South Downs Cottage (Good Omens), crowley's plants - Freeform, having what you want doesn't mean it is easy, only a little explicit, the beginning of the rest of their lives
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-17
Updated: 2020-06-29
Packaged: 2021-03-04 03:54:48
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 8
Words: 18,709
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24777232
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/kate_the_reader/pseuds/kate_the_reader
Summary: Aziraphale and Crowley have moved to that cottage near Devil's Dyke in the South Downs. Living together is sweet and challenging and surprising -- but settling in takes time.This is a story about stepping into the rest of their lives, in a place that is home to both of them, together.
Relationships: Aziraphale/Crowley (Good Omens)
Series: His sun [7]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1480562
Comments: 50
Kudos: 58





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

  * For [PyotrIljich](https://archiveofourown.org/users/PyotrIljich/gifts).



The last box has been carried in, the last of Crowley's plants set down in the conservatory, the furniture is still every which way.

Crowley flops down on the sofa.

"Remind me why we did this the human way, angel?"

Aziraphale joins him. "Because people would notice, if the house was suddenly just moved into and they hadn't seen a moving van. They'd wonder, they'd talk."

Crowley sighs. "And not just people. Don't want to draw the other sort of attention either. That'd be a frivolous use of power, wouldn't it? Moving all your books—"

"Not to mention all your plants, dear."

"And two beds."

"Several sofas."

"My chair."

"Your chair."

Crowley means the sagging one from the shop he likes best. Aziraphale means his preposterous carved golden throne, which Crowley had been all for leaving behind.

All the many parts of a shared life: two long-lived-in flats, one overstuffed ancient bookshop, a plant room which sometimes seemed larger than the flat that contained it, all in one new home.


	2. A garden

After that momentous trip to Devil's Dyke and Fulking and Brighton, a trip that seemed, when they thought about it afterwards, to mark one of the great fulcrums of their lives, they looked in earnest for a home in the country, in that particular bit of country. Neither of them was surprised when they found it, at the end of a lane, on the side of a hill, in sight of the sea. Neglected and overgrown, but sound. The windows dusty, but lighting pretty rooms with ample shelves; the garden wild, but with fruit trees and roses among the bindweed and thistles; a large conservatory and a Bentley-sized garage. 

"It's perfect," Aziraphale said almost immediately. Crowley, less optimistic, more suspicious, hmmm'd and agreed it might suit them, and felt around with his demon senses for traces of his old lot and found none. And later did more worldly research and found no odd conditions imposed in a centuries-old will, no dry rot in the roof timbers, no mould behind the tiles. Aziraphale used his angelic senses and declared that generations of humans had been reasonably happy in it, all things considered. 

So, three months after their first holiday; three months after that night in Crowley's bed, when Aziraphale had helped Crowley understand his place in the great plan; three months after they agreed that everything had changed and they should change their lives as well; three months after all that and only six weeks after they first saw the house, they're sitting — exhausted, smudged with dust and cobwebs — on the sofa.

They’re sitting on the sofa, the same sofa they’ve sat on together for decades, the sofa with the worn velvet cushions, indented with their shapes, smelling slightly of book dust and — Crowley is convinced — Aziraphale’s cologne, they’re sitting on their sofa, in their sitting room, in their house, in their  _ home _ .

Their teasing banter has run out, they’re just sitting there, looking at each other. Aziraphale reaches out and brushes a cobweb from Crowley’s hair, which has mostly fallen from the bun he put it into to keep it out of the way. Crowley smiles tiredly and catches Aziraphale’s hand, holding it against his face, turning into it, brushing his mouth against the palm.

“Our home," he says, into Aziraphale's skin. "I've never really had one."

"Crowley, darling."

"I've had places I've lived; I liked some of them well enough, but never a home. A home isn't just a place."

"It's a feeling."

"Of being safe."

"Understood."

"Valued."

"Cared for."

"Loved."

"Yes, my Crowley. Loved."

Crowley shifts closer so he can lean against Aziraphale; he brings his arm up and holds Crowley close. The evening sun slants through the window, a golden slab on the floor in which dust motes dance. They're not looking at the dust, just at the light.

In the morning, they are woken by birds singing right outside the window.

“Bloody birds,” Crowley grumbles, with no bite, pulling Aziraphale closer.

“The dawn chorus!” 

“Hush, angel, maybe they’ll stop if we ignore them,” Crowley buries his nose in Aziraphale’s hair and starts to drift again.

Aziraphale wriggles in his arms. “Don’t you want to get up and see your garden in the morning light?”

“Mmmpf.” Crowley’s breath tickles the back of his neck. “Still be there tomorrow morning.”

“But  _ this _ morning is the first morning of the rest of our lives.”

Aziraphale is usually happy to indulge Crowley’s indolence, and has become very fond of their beds himself, but this morning he is itchy with impatience to see it all, now it’s their home, full of their things. Eager to fill it up even more with themselves.

“Well,” says Crowley, pausing to place a kiss under Aziraphale’s ear and nearly destroy his urge to get out of bed, “when you put it that way …” he leans over and places another kiss on Aziraphale’s cheekbone, and another on his mouth. “When you put it like that, I suppose we should go out. Survey our domain.”

Aziraphale’s mouth twitches into a smile that he can feel warming his whole face. “ _ Our _ domain,” he repeats.

So they get up, and go downstairs, through the higgledy-piggledy sitting room, down the hall, and throw open the front door.

Dew sparkles on every leaf and petal in the overgrown garden.

Aziraphale glances at the garden, but he  _ looks _ at Crowley — and sees the sort of tenderness there that he often sees directed at himself. 

"This will all need to be whipped into shape," Crowley says, trying for gruffness but falling far short. "Terrible amount of work." But Aziraphale sees the smile that's tugging at the corner of his mouth.

“Well,” he says, “unpacking and shelving all the books will take weeks, no doubt. I haven’t even seen some of them since I opened the shop.” 

They hired a removal company to get their things down to Devil’s Dyke, but Aziraphale caused the bookshop’s contents to be boxed up. He’s greatly looking forward to unearthing forgotten treasures.

“We’ll both be busy, then,” says Crowley. He tugs on Aziraphale’s hand. “Shall we explore?”

They’ve walked around the garden and the house several times in the course of purchasing the property, but it’s different now that it’s completely theirs.

Aziraphale looks down at himself: he’s wearing only what he was when they fell into bed: seagreen silk pants; Crowley only his sleek black boxer briefs.

Crowley sees his dubious look and laughs. “No one to see us here, in our own secluded garden, angel.”

Aziraphale shakes off an ancient memory, of two people in a garden, newly conscious of what they were not wearing.

“It’s a bit muddy underfoot, perhaps, darling.”

Crowley snaps his fingers and two pairs of Wellington boots appear beside the door. And so they step out into the morning garden in their pants and the shiny new boots.

Crowley leads the way as they walk past beds once filled with flowers, now mostly run to seed and weeds. There are roses, though, straggling, badly in need of pruning. On one, a single bud is just open, the gold of an evening sky, the gold of Crowley’s eyes. He reaches over and plucks it, and turns and presents it to Aziraphale. 

The scent of it, when he inhales, is freshness and citrus and just a hint of spice. It’s a simple flower, that Crowley had no hand in nurturing, but it is a promise, of more to come, in this place that is their home now.

“Thank you, my love,” he says, his voice choked by his heart, which seems to fill his chest and his throat.

“’S nothing,” says Crowley, but he blinks a sparkle of dew from his eyes, caressing a petal. “I’ll grow you more,” he says. “Come look at the orchard.”

Aziraphale holds his rose carefully as they walk further, inhaling its lovely scent. Later, he places it in a water glass (having no vase) on the table next to their blue bed, and its scent fills the room.

The house is not large, but it’s more than enough for the two of them. There are two bedrooms, one for each of their beds. 

“Why do you want to bring both? We can only sleep in one, angel,” Crowley said when Aziraphale booked the removal van. “Will that huge thing even fit?”

“I do love our blue bed,” he had to explain. “So comfortable. But your bed is where you taught me … how to be touched. Where you allowed me to see all of you. You have given me so much in that bed, I couldn’t bear never to lie in it with you again.”

“And it’s where you helped me see … my place. You’re right, there’s a lot in that bed. You don’t have to lean against the carvings though.” Which Aziraphale knew was Crowley’s attempt to get past something that is almost too big to think about often. 

The bed is really too large for a cottage bedroom, but it does fit, somehow that the removal men couldn’t understand. The blue one seems more at home, and there’s space in that room for a wardrobe they don’t yet own.

But it’s the bookshelves that interest Aziraphale most. Crowley slips into his conservatory to see to his plants, and Aziraphale soon hears him talking to them, his tone brisk, but not harsh, and even dropping into soft inquiry.

He turns to his own work with a smile, prising open the top of the first of very, very many cardboard boxes — a shocking number really — and is soon lost among their contents. 

He is so absorbed in his task he doesn’t hear the car in the driveway, and is startled by the knock at the open front door. He steps into the hall; a woman is standing at the door, smiling and holding a biscuit tin. 

“Hello?” says Aziraphale, hoping he sounds more welcoming than baffled.

“Oh, hello!” says the woman, who is older, with cropped-short silver hair and a startling patchwork coat. “I’m Marjorie Care. We saw you’d arrived, and I thought I would just come and welcome you. Mr Fell, is it?”

“Yes, it is. How kind. Do come in.” He’s flustered into almost losing his manners. 

Marjorie Care steps into the hall, looking around with interest.

“Please excuse the mess, we only arrived yesterday. So much unpacking to do!”

“I won’t stay, just thought you might like something with your tea. Unpacking is so tiring, you deserve a nibble.”

“Oh, yes. How very kind.” Aziraphale takes the biscuit tin she’s offering him.

“Everyone is so glad you’ve bought this house. It’s been empty rather a long time.” The estate agent told them that, but didn’t say why. “It’s the lane. If it rains for a week, the lane becomes impassable," she says.

“Ah, thank you. We’ll make it a point to watch the forecasts, stock up in bad weather.” The truth, of course, is that it won’t bother them particularly if they get stuck here and run out of food. Definitely not Crowley.

“Well, I mustn’t distract you from your unpacking,” says Marjorie Care.

“Thank you for stopping by. And for the biscuits,” Aziraphale says on the doorstep. “Goodbye,” he calls, as she walks down the path to her car in the drive.

Crowley comes through from his conservatory. “Who was that, angel?” 

“Our first visitor. She brought us a gift.”

“A gift?”

“Yes, a tin of biscuits. To have with our tea.”

“An emissary. Come to investigate the newcomers. Report back.”

“Crowley!”

“Well, wouldn’t you be curious if two weird strangers bought a house no one wanted?”

“It’s the lane, impassable in bad weather, she said. But you’re right. Who can blame them?”

“It’s going to be harder, living here. Not like London where we could be anonymous.”

It’s always been much easier for Aziraphale to seem human, people just think he’s a bit odd, in a way lots of humans are; but they’re bound to wonder more about Crowley, about the glasses, at least. They will have to tell a plausible fib or two. Aziraphale can’t decide if that should give him a pang of guilt.

“How are your plants?” he asks, to move away from a difficult subject.

“They seem reasonably happy, no ill effects from the move aside from a broken leaf here and there. I set them right.”

“I heard you talking to them.”

Crowley laughs, almost guiltily. “Old habits.”

“Nonsense. They’d be lost without your voice.”

“They hardly recognise me.”

“They’ll soon be used to the kinder, gentler Crowley.”

Crowley harrumphs and blushes. “Let’s have tea and try those biscuits,” he says, deflecting.

After tea and Marjorie Care’s delicious biscuits — even Crowley eats more than one — Aziraphale is lazy, sitting on the sofa with Crowley’s socked toes pushed under his thigh against the house’s lingering chill, his hand curled around one bony ankle.

Crowley nods at the shelves, still not remotely full. “Find any treasures you’d forgotten?”

Aziraphale turns to look, his eye falling on a lurid paperback that doesn’t really fit with the others. The book they held in both their hands together, but did not open, that day in the bookshop when everything changed. One of the many days when everything changed. 

“No forgotten treasures yet, lots of memories,” he says.

"We never looked at it together," says Crowley, his voice soft. He’s seen it too, the Le Guin paperback.

Aziraphale could pretend not to know what Crowley means, but that would be telling a lie, and he cannot do that to him, he will not, ever. Never again.

"No, we didn't. I kept it to remind myself. Not that I needed to be reminded how deeply I hurt you. I was trying to be honest with myself _." _ His voice is close to breaking. "I don't want to look at it, but I will if you do."

Crowley leans closer, reaching for his hands. "Hush, angel, we don't have to look. Why even keep it, if it's so painful?"

"I can't throw it away!" Even if he never sees the painting again, he won't toss it out. "I lost so many, over the years," he adds, and tears overflow his eyes.

Crowley unfolds his legs and pulls Aziraphale into his lap, one hand rubbing his back, the other cradling his head, his long fingers in Aziraphale's hair, soothing, comforting, murmuring not-words. Aziraphale leans against him, just as he did that day in the bookshop, when everything changed.

"You've made others," Crowley says, his breath whispering at Aziraphale's ear, "and you will make others still. And you've got me. I'll always be here."

"I know, my darling. Perhaps I'm just tired." Even though he doesn't get tired, really. 

Ever since he and Crowley took the final step towards each other, that day in the bookshop, it's as if a dam has been breached. Now that he's not denying his feelings, pushing them down, holding them at arm's length, he is easily overwhelmed by them. He is glad to feel, but it can be tiring.

"I've got you," says Crowley, and holds him closer, so Aziraphale can feel the rise and fall of his chest, and smell the damp soil of his plants lingering on his fingers. Aziraphale relaxes into the safety of Crowley and tries to let go of the guilt that the picture holds. Crowley has forgiven him, now he needs to forgive himself.

They sit like that a long time, as the light in the room moves in ways that are not yet familiar, casting the shadows of overgrown ivy onto the walls, as if the house itself was a garden. 

At last, Aziraphale shifts his weight, his neck a little stiff, concerned for Crowley's knees, but Crowley doesn't loosen his hold.

"My dear, aren't you—?"

"'M fine.” Crowley is emphatic. Aziraphale forces himself to relax again. 

“You are  _ not _ a burden,” says Crowley. 

Sometimes Aziraphale feels heavy with the weight of all the centuries he denied Crowley, all the many times he accepted his gifts of service and selflessness and gave so little of himself in return. Thinking about that picture only makes his regret sharper, piercing through his happiness in the present. 

“Angel,” says Crowley, “let it go.”

“I want to. I can’t. I’m trying!” He hears the thread of panic in his own voice.

“Right,” says Crowley briskly, “enough of this. Come upstairs.” 

He lifts Aziraphale off his lap and stands up, takes his hand, pulling it from where the pair are twisting together, and leads him up the stairs. He steps into the bathroom and turns on the taps, filling the room with noise and steam, and begins to undress Aziraphale: his waistcoat and shirt unbuttoned, his suspenders pushed off his shoulders, his trouser flies unfastened. It’s oddly matter-of-fact, he’s not unwrapping him sensually, as he usually does. He crouches down to take off Aziraphale’s shoes, lift his feet out of his trousers. Aziraphale pulls off his socks and pants, steps into the bath and sinks into the hot water.

The fact that the cottage had a big tub was a relief when they first visited the house. It’s another indulgence Aziraphale has come to enjoy, something he likes to do with Crowley. 

“Come in?” he asks now.

“Course.” Crowley pulls off his shirt and pushes his jeans down, revealing the long sinuous line of his body, and gets into the water behind Aziraphale, coaxing him to lie back against his chest, his knees like the tall peaks of mountains rising out of a lake. 

The heat and the touch of Crowley’s skin against his skin soothe him.

“Do you remember,” says Crowley, pouring a palmful of warm water over Aziraphale’s head like a benediction, “the first day, the day we met? How you lifted your wing when the first rain fell, not to shelter yourself, but to shelter me, a nightmare who’d just slithered up beside you and asked difficult questions?” He pours another palmful, and follows the water with his long fingers, pushing through Aziraphale’s curls, tugging slightly. “Do you remember that? Because I have never forgotten what that felt like. You didn’t hesitate, even for a minute, even for a second. You just did it, brought me under your wing. Me! Who had just destroyed the perfect harmony of that garden. Your garden!”

“Not mine.”

“Yeah, well. Heaven’s garden. God’s garden.” Both of Crowley’s hands are in his hair now, fingers curved around Aziraphale’s skull. “You did it without thinking. You gave me something that had been torn away from me — forever, I thought. You gave me kindness. You gave me  _ kindness, _ Aziraphale.” His voice almost breaks on that, but he keeps touching, soothing.

“I remember, Crowley.”

“You have always given me kindness.”

“Not always.” He can’t help it, returning to the memory that started this.

“Far, far more often than not.” Crowley’s voice is firm, he’ll listen to no more argument. “Now lean forward. Let me wash your hair.” Aziraphale does as he’s told. The shampoo smells of flowers and herbs — of growing things.

When he is finished the washing, ending with more palmfuls of water poured over Aziraphale’s head, Crowley gets out of the bath and brings a towel to enfold him, rubbing his hair dry with another, and then steps out of the room and returns with his gown, slipping it onto his shoulders, where it settles with its familiar weight of heavily embroidered silk. 

It strikes Aziraphale as it has not, properly, before: with its flowers and birds and fruits, the beloved garment is a garden. Crowley gave him  a garden before they ever saw this place. 


	3. Star-builder

Unpacking centuries worth of hoarded books takes far longer than Aziraphale thought it would, but perhaps that's because he gets lost in memories and rediscoveries, lost among books and other treasures, reminders of his long time on Earth, with its many pleasures, its multitude of things. A long-forgotten favourite quill, its tip stained with red ink. The red and white string that tied a cake box. The purple ribbon from a chocolate box. Petals from a bouquet, pressed between the pages of a book. Opera tickets. The programme from the first night of one of Oscar's clever plays. The hastily scrawled bill from a restaurant in Paris. Books are good hiding places for sentimental objects. Bookshelves are good places to keep small items. Treasures that had been carefully carried, kept safe for millennia, could be hidden in a box and placed on a shelf among ever-accumulating books and papers. He sets one particular little box on the mantel. 

Crowley spends his days in the garden, battling weeds. He may not speak harshly to his own plants anymore, but he has no compunction about menacing ground elder — Aziraphale hears him through the window and smiles to himself. And pauses from his own labours to step outside with a glass of cool water for Crowley, following his voice to find him among the beds and paths. Crowley straightens, pushing stray tendrils of hair off his forehead, leaving behind a streak of mud, and pulling his glasses down to look at Aziraphale. His eyes gleam with satisfaction and interest. He is busy and happy here in his garden.

It's late in the year, too late to plant, but there is plenty to do.

"I want to get it ready. Find out what's here. Show it who's boss," he explains to Aziraphale. "It's good to be busy," he says. "I'm better when I have a project." 

Crowley loves to sleep, but he likes to have something to occupy his energy — of body and mind — when he's not. Aziraphale never used to sleep, but he's always been indolent in other ways, letting things pile up in unsteady heaps, content to idle away hours in a book. Aziraphale is finding Crowley's energy contagious, and he hopes he can help his beloved find calm and quiet in new ways too. As he potters among his books, he notes volumes that Crowley might enjoy.

The days stretch out, fine and golden, an endless summer, it seems, to welcome them to their new life. They don't go out, content to enjoy their new home, and each other in it. They've seen no one since Marjorie Care brought them her gift of biscuits the very first day.

Crowley finds two deckchairs in the garage and sets them up on the lawn. He lures Aziraphale out to sit with him in the soft dusk, takes off his shoes and socks, cradling his feet and setting them in the cool grass.

"Oh, my dear! That's blissful!" Aziraphale can't remember the last time he walked barefoot in grass. 

"I've been such an urban creature, since towns began, I suppose."

"Stands to reason, live among the humans. Got to be close enough to dole out blessings," Crowley says. "I've always liked cities. Lots of scope for mischief, big rewards for the least effort; you know I like that."

Aziraphale laughs, Crowley is not being entirely accurate in his self-assessment, but he doesn't contradict him.

"I don't think I miss it yet," he says, "I wonder if I will?"

"It's still there, we can go back if we want."

"I like being here with you. In our home. I don't want to leave."

"Not now, but you know, forever is a long time, angel." Crowley reaches for Aziraphale's hand, holds it tight as evening settles into night and the stars come out.

"I've missed seeing stars," says Aziraphale.

"Yeah." Crowley's voice is very quiet and a little rough. "There are some wonderful ones."

Crowley asked Aziraphale to run away to Alpha Centauri. It seemed so fanciful at the time and Aziraphale was so confused and afraid he didn't even consider it. Hadn't yet admitted to himself that Crowley was everything to him. And now here they are, in a cottage in a garden, with their books and their plants and their sofas and their beds; with tea and biscuits. Everything is perfect for Aziraphale, but perhaps Crowley wants more, wants bigger.

Aziraphale isn't looking up anymore, he's looking sideways, at Crowley, whose eyes are shining in the darkness, his lips parted. He's gazing up with wonder, with love, with pride.

"I would go with you," Aziraphale says, "if you asked me again."

Crowley lowers his eyes from the stars to Aziraphale. "That was desperation," he says. "We have this world back. It's enough. It will always be enough, if you are in it. More than enough."

Aziraphale's heart feels too big for his chest, he feels it beating in his throat. He thinks he loves Crowley as much as it is possible to love, but there is no limit to how Crowley loves — like the sky and all that is in it, seen and unseen.

They sit under the dome of the sky all night, watching. Crowley watching rapt as the stars wheel above, Aziraphale watching Crowley.

"The sky is different here than the one I used to gaze up at, in the desert. I can't see all the stars that kept me company there," he says.

"I used to look up too," says Aziraphale, "and wonder if you were looking up at the same stars."

"I was." He falls silent, and Aziraphale waits for what he might say next, in this mood of melancholy reminiscence.

"I missed them. I missed my place among them, my job."

" Star-builder ."

"Celestial bricklayer."

"More than that, my dear."

"Not really. I like making things. Getting my hands dirty." 

Aziraphale watches as Crowley looks around the garden he is making his own.

"That lot down below always wondered why I didn't do more traditional tempting — one priest corrupted, one woman led astray. Ugh, I hated that, I couldn't bear getting so close to them, only to hurt them."

He doesn't say, but Aziraphale knows he's thinking of one woman led astray and all humans stained.

"Much better to do my elaborate schemes. More interesting, less intimate. They thought I was mad, fooling around moving surveyors' beacons on the M25." He laughs a little bitterly. "That one bit me in the arse. The phone caper did as well, I suppose."

Aziraphale reaches for his hand again. "Oh, darling," he says. 

"No," says Crowley, "I'm not sorry, really. I enjoyed those schemes, kept me busy for ages, those rats did."

Aziraphale can't help smiling at the thought of Crowley training rats to bring the phone networks down. But Crowley's lighter mood evaporates and he falls silent again.

"Tell me about the stars," prompts Aziraphale. "Tell me about the ones you love best."

Crowley stands up, pulling Aziraphale with him. 

"Easier to show you if we sit on the lawn."

Dew has dampened the grass, but when Aziraphale sits down with Crowley it is perfectly dry.

"Come, angel, lean on me," he says, guiding Aziraphale to sit as they sit in the bath, secure in the circle of his limbs, Crowley's chin on his shoulder, his breath teasing Aziraphale's ear.

"Do you know," he says, "when we came out here the first time, this is what I wanted to do, lie on your rug and look up at the stars. I'm not sorry we stayed in that B&B, though." He kisses the secret tender spot below Aziraphale's ear, making him shiver, with sensation and recollection, and close his eyes to return to that bathroom, that wall, where Crowley adored him, where Crowley overwhelmed him. He turns his face to kiss Crowley’s throat, tasting the salt of his labours there.

“Tell me about your stars,” he whispers into Crowley’s skin. “Show me where you wanted to go.”

“Alpha Centauri. I can’t show it to you. Can’t really see it from here anymore. We lost it, it slipped south. Long time since I saw it.” His voice is wistful. "So bright. So close! Do you know, it's not one, it’s two, bound together, locked in an embrace forever. Forever, angel."

"Darling," Aziraphale breathes, and he bites his lip, to stop all the emotion inside himself from flooding out, overflowing the breached dam. Crowley's arms tighten around him, around his chest, holding him safe.

"I can’t show it to you from here, but close your eyes, my angel, and we can go and see it."

Aziraphale closes his eyes, gives himself over to pure sensation, to the closeness of Crowley, to his warmth, to his strength, to the beating of his heart, to the caress of his breath. To the power of his mind. To the depth of his love. He leans against Crowley and loosens his hold on his corporeal form, on himself in this place, on this grass, surrounded by these nightsounds.

And then he opens his eyes, not the weak eyes of his human corporation but the multitude of far-seeing, all-seeing eyes of his true form, and he sees all the stars of the heavens, the endless expanse of space. He sees Crowley in his true form, profoundly beautiful, awesomely terrible. And he sees the twin stars that Crowley loves, sees them through Crowley's consciousness, all his pride in the building of them, all the pain of his loss of them. 

With all his eyes he looks, and is filled with the sight.

After a time — an instant, an hour, an æon? he could not say — he is newly aware of Crowley, of the multitudes he contains — beloved star builder, ever-questioning rebel, lonely outcast, tempter, lover, servant, saviour — as they sit together, in their well-loved corporations, on the grass of their garden, secure in the tenderness of this night. He hears again the beating of their two hearts, the pumping of the blood through the very humanish bodies they have chosen to inhabit. He feels his body against Crowley's, their warmth warming each other, their strength holding each other, the sighing of their breaths in unison.

To have all of this, and all of that … "Thank you," he says, and he is saying it both to Crowley and to God.

To Crowley for showing him, for waiting for him, for giving him his everything. To God for giving them this afterwards, this forever. For allowing Crowley to lay celestial bricks, for having a place for them together in the great plan for the world, for allowing Aziraphale to be here, with Crowley at last, in their own paradise.

Off to his left, where Crowley has always been, the eastern sky grows lighter. Soon the sun will rise. His sun never sets.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's true that Alpha Centauri is no longer visible from the Northern Hemisphere. It slipped south.


	4. Gold and silver

"Angel?" Crowley is calling for him as he comes in the back door; Aziraphale hears him pausing to get his Wellington boots off, huffing with mild annoyance. "Aziraphale?"

"I'm in here." He's filled all the shelves in the sitting room and moved on into the dining room. Not that they have a table. Or eat meals. It's an empty room and he's unpacking books and stacking them in neat piles along the walls. Neatish piles. 

Crowley appears in the doorway, with something in his hand. 

"There you are," he says. His hair is straggling out of the braid Aziraphale put it in last night and there's a long scratch on one forearm, beaded with blood. His face is glowing. "Brought you something," he says, coming forward.

"What's that, my love?"

Crowley's smile is wide and soft. " A pear ." He holds it out, plump and golden in the cup of his hand.

"I like pears," says Aziraphale.

"I know you do. I remember, you said." But Crowley's smile dims. "I shouldn't have said that. Reminded you. Forget it."

"I haven't forgotten," says Aziraphale quietly, brushing his thumb lightly up the scratch on Crowley's arm, erasing it. "You brought me a pear! Thank you!"

"There was only this one left. Birds've had the rest."

Aziraphale accepts the gift, holding it in his joined hands. Crowley's fingers linger on his, and then he drags them up his arm, where there is no sign of the injury left. "Brambles," he says. "Thank you, angel."

“Will you eat it with me?”

“Alright.”

Aziraphale holds it up, inhales its perfume, and bites into it, his teeth releasing sweet sweet juice that floods his mouth and runs down his chin. “Oh!”

Crowley leans in, but he doesn’t bite the pear, he licks the juice from Aziraphale’s skin. “Mmmmm, delicious.”

Aziraphale takes another bite, savouring its pleasing graininess, and a trickle of juice runs down his wrist, almost to his shirt cuff, but Crowley catches it on his tongue. And so it goes, a bite, a lick, until the pear is only a scrap of core, and Crowley chases the last of its sweetness in Aziraphale’s mouth.

They have had very many moments of intense intimacy since they began, but the domestic intimacy of this feels especially sweet to Aziraphale.

“Thank you, my darling,” he whispers when Crowley draws back a fraction, his tongue tracing his bottom lip, which surely no longer bears any juice at all.

“Only a taste. Next summer, angel, I’ll bring you pears every day. And roses.”

“You spoil me terribly.”

“Nonsense. ’S only a pear.” Crowley is blushing, deflecting, as he so often does when he has done something for Aziraphale.

“A delicious pear, and your delicious mouth. I feel very well spoiled.” Aziraphale pulls him in for more kisses.

And takes him upstairs, to bathe with him in scented water and brush tangles and stray leaves from his hair and lead him to their soft blue bed and spoil him with his mouth, an almost domestic intimacy, particularly sweet.

At last, Aziraphale’s boxes are unpacked: there are books filling all the shelves, books stacked in the dining room, and books piled on each stair. Perhaps it would have been wiser to leave them boxed until there are more shelves, but he couldn’t wait, and it was something to do while Crowley did battle in his garden. 

They haven’t left their home since they arrived. 

“We should go out, don’t you think?” 

They are standing together in the garden, where the beds have been cleared of weeds and the skeletons of dead annuals, the roses pruned to sad-looking sticks from which new growth will spring, the soggy mess of fallen leaves raked from the lawn and the paths.

Standing together in their garden looking out over the ground falling away to the sea.

“Go for a drive, anywhere we want to go?”

“Go into the village? Go to the pub? Meet people?”

He knows Crowley has been hesitant about this reality of their move to a small place. He makes a quiet noise, of unhappiness, almost.

“I didn’t use to care. Dark glasses — bit of a bastard, who cares, won’t meet them again. Never used to matter. I liked it, really. But here …”

“People are far more tolerant of oddity than you fear, my dear.”

“S’pose there’s only one way to find out.”

“That’s right. Shall we lunch at the Shepherd and Dog?”

It’s been a while since they ate; Marjorie Care’s biscuits are long gone. Aziraphale misses it.

The weather has finally turned towards winter. A sharp squall of rain hits as Crowley backs the Bentley out of the garage. He leans across the seat to open the door for Aziraphale. 

“Get in, angel.”

Aziraphale settles into the passenger seat, no longer afraid of Crowley’s driving, at ease in the car, at ease in his trust. The lane is narrow, in high summer the hedges might brush the sides of the vehicle. Crowley drives carefully, mindful of the ruts and the mud. Aziraphale feels his thigh muscles flexing, under the hand he has laid there.

The high street of the village is empty, they park right outside the pub. The room is warm and quiet when they step in, brushing raindrops from their hair. William Gladwish looks up from the newspaper he's got spread out on the bar. 

"Welcome!" He leans across, smiling, hand outstretched to shake. "All settled into your new house?"

"Oh!" Aziraphale is rather startled by the gesture; they've lived among humans for so very long, but rarely been treated with such open friendliness by mere acquaintances. His hand is engulfed by the big, slightly rough grasp of the publican. "Yes! I'm, that is, we … we're getting there. Slowly. Rather a lot to do!"

"I'm sure there is, old cottage like that."

“And in the garden. Crowley’s very busy; it will be lovely in spring.” He can’t help the look he gives Crowley — fond, a bit possessive — a look he hadn’t dared give him in public before everything changed. He wants these new acquaintances to understand what they are to each other, to accept them together. They seem to have done so far. 

Crowley makes a self-deprecating shape with his mouth. “It’s got good bones,” he says. Aziraphale can't see his eyes, but he knows them, knows the way Crowley looks at him, he sees that look in his mind, feels it in his heart. He almost wants to take Crowley's hands and lead him out of the pub, back into the car, wait for him to drive them just out of sight and pull him into his lap and take his glasses off and lose himself in Crowley's eyes. In the heat of them, the warmth of them.

They've been alone together for weeks, he bathes in Crowley's regard every hour, every day, and all it took was the old barrier and Aziraphale almost can't think.

But he pulls himself together with an actual full body shake (Crowley's mouth curls in a small private smile that he has to look away from).

"We have been awfully busy, but we've rather forgotten our manners, hiding away."

"Never worry about that," says William Gladwish, "whenever you're ready. People would like to meet you, we don't get many new neighbours. When you're ready. Now, what'll it be?"

He directs their attention to the menu board while he pours their red wine. "Soup's excellent, broccoli and Stilton; the fish is off the boat this morning.” He slides their glasses across the counter. "Take your time deciding, we're hardly run off our feet, as you can see."

They sit at a table in a window bay, far from the fire burning in the pub's high, wide hearth.

"The soup for me," says Crowley, toasting Aziraphale silently with a raised glass before taking a first sip of his wine. "Sounds fantastically stinky, positively sulphurous. Just my sort of thing."

There's a wicked gleam in his eyes, which Aziraphale can see, because Crowley, sitting with his back to the room, has lowered his glasses just enough.

"I think I'll try the fish. And, oh look, they have a treacle tart for afters."

William Gladwish comes over to take their orders. “Where is that sweet young man, Chris, was it?” Aziraphale asks.

“Off back at uni, he was only here for the summer rush. Might get him back at Christmas. He’s a good lad, is Chris.”

William Gladwish has just gone back behind the bar when a younger man comes in. The place is quiet enough for them to hear him say: “Fantastic old car out there. Whose is it, d’you know, Bill?”

William Gladwish nods in their direction. “Mr Crowley and Mr Fell’s. New neighbours. They bought the cottage up the lane.”

The newcomer heads towards them. “That’s a brilliant car,” he says. “Thirties Bentley?”

“1926, actually,” says Crowley.

“Looks in mint condition. I’m Gavin, by the way,” he says, extending a hand to shake.

“One careful owner,” says Crowley.

Aziraphale buries his face in his glass to stop himself laughing outright.

“Before me, of course,” Crowley hastens to add.

“Lucky find. I’d love to look under the bonnet some time,” says Gavin. “Where do you get it serviced? I own the Fulking garage.”

“Well, in London, up till now,” Crowley lies. “I’ll bring it round sometime.”

“That’d be great. Don’t get to see inside one like that very often. Well, I’ll leave you in peace. Nice to meet you, Mr Crowley, Mr Fell.”

“Just Crowley,” says Crowley. “Everyone calls me Crowley.”

“Oh, okay,” says Gavin, “See you down the garage, Crowley.”

When he has walked back to the bar and picked up the pint William Gladwish has pulled for him, Aziraphale raises an eyebrow and says, for Crowley’s ears only: “One careful owner?”

Crowley looks at him over his glasses, smirking. “What was I supposed to say?”

It’s so delightfully absurd that Aziraphale laughs, and nudges Crowley’s foot with his foot. Crowley lays his hand over Aziraphale’s on the table and takes another sip of his wine, still smiling.

The pub fills with more people as they wait for their food. It’s clear that it’s a hub for the community rather than just a place to drink.

The food is good; Aziraphale sighs over the treacle tart and persuades Crowley to try a bite. 

People glance at them as they enter and settle, in a friendly way. It is hard to guess what they think, what they see, in Aziraphale and Crowley. And hard to know if he is influencing what they think. He's not trying to, not really.

"You see, Crowley," Aziraphale says as they drive the short distance back to the cottage. "No one thinks we're too odd for Fulking."

"I wouldn't go that far, angel," says Crowley, "they're probably wondering what a lovely chap like you is doing with a flash bastard like me. Even if I do drive a 'brilliant' car."

"Nonsense, my dear, that young Gavin genuinely admired the Bentley. He thinks you're a  _ lucky _ bastard to drive it. And when you take it to a garage for the first time ever, he'll be thrilled to change its oil, or whatever it is garage owners do to cars." 

Crowley laughs. "I'll have to take it to Brighton first, get some oil put  _ into _ it for him to change." He nods at the fuel gauge, the needle pointing to E as it always does. "And fill up with petrol."

"You wily old serpent," says Aziraphale, giving his knee a fond pat.

The windows of the cottage greet them with golden warmth as the car crunches the driveway gravel and Aziraphale's heart gives a funny wobble. It's their home, his and Crowley's together, full of their love.

“What’s this, angel?”

Aziraphale hears Crowley in the sitting room from the kitchen where he’s making tea. He carries the mugs through.

Crowley is standing in front of the empty fireplace, holding the little box Aziraphale put on the mantel when he was unpacking.

“What’s what, my dear?”

“This, what is it?” Crowley shakes the box gently, making the small object within rattle. Aziraphale sets both tea mugs down on the mantel and looks into the box with Crowley. He has never forgotten this tiny keepsake, even as it rested in a box on a bookshelf in a bookshop crowded with things.

Crowley pokes a finger into the box, touching the small black object.

“Oh!” he says, surprised. “Is that … it can’t be … but I can feel …” He picks it up carefully and drops it into the palm of his other hand.

It’s a little silver thing, blackened with tarnish, a bit crumpled. Aziraphale touches it with just the tip of his finger — and the tarnish begins to recede, revealing the gleam of the metal.

“Is it …? Aziraphale, was this mine?”

“Yes, for a short while. It fell off the wreath you wore, when we met … when we dined together. In Rome.”

Crowley looks up at him, his eyes shining with saltwater. “You kept it for two thousand years?”

“Yes.”

“Why?”

“Crowley, you know why.”

“Okay, yes, but, how? How did you manage to keep something like this all that time?”

“In pockets, or a bag sometimes, in this little box. I might have done a small … miracle, to keep it safe. When I got the shop, I stopped carrying it around. I could always look at it. I never forgot it.”

“You carried a silver leaf that fell off a frankly ill-advised bit of adornment I wore once, for all these years? Through everything?”

“I did. I’m a sentimental old silly. You know that.”

“Not silly.” Crowley’s voice is a rough growl and he reaches for Aziraphale’s hand, pulls him close, still holding the leaf, now untarnished and shining, in the cup of his hand. “I can feel you in it too,” he says, and brushes a kiss over Aziraphale’s temple. “Two thousand years. You kept it for two thousand years.” His voice is filled with the wonder of how long they’ve loved each other, even if they couldn’t always admit it. 

Something unfurls in Aziraphale’s chest, like a crumpled new leaf in springtime: the certainty of being able to think it and feel it and know it and say it. “I love you, Crowley, for as many years as there are.”

On the mantel, two cups of tea go cold, forgotten.


	5. Storm clouds

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the chapter that is explicit, but it's not super graphic. Crowley POV in this chapter.

The golden days that welcomed them are gone now, and the wind howls round the corners of the house, exposed as it is on the side of a hill, in sight of the sea. 

Everything that needs to be unpacked has been taken out of its box and put somewhere; there’s nothing more for Aziraphale to do indoors. The garden has been tidied for winter; there is nothing more Crowley can do outdoors. 

Crowley stalks among his own plants, all settled in the conservatory, poking a finger into soil to gauge the dryness, picking off a dead leaf here and there, talking to them. But it’s not the same. Somehow they hold his attention less than they used to. Or perhaps they never did, as much as he told himself they did, as much as he needed them to, when he took out his fear and his frustration, his thwarted, yearning, painful love, on his orchids and his ferns, his flytraps and pitcher plants. Some of them are lovely, and some weirdly fascinating, but the way they used to sustain him is gone, replaced by Aziraphale and this place and his new love, the garden. 

He is itchy with a need to be outside, shivery at the thought of  _ being _ outside in this weather. He can't settle to anything. So he does what he has always done when he felt like scratching off his own skin with frustration: he sleeps. 

It always worked in the past, when he couldn't bear to be around Aziraphale anymore without having him; couldn't face another evening of companionable drinking — of watching a drop of red wine paint his lip crimson, knowing he would never be allowed to lick it off; couldn't hear Aziraphale call him "my dear" one more time — "my dear" and never "my darling"; when he just couldn't keep up the pretence that they were nothing more than friendly rivals, longtime associates or however Aziraphale thought of them. When it all got too much, he would go to bed and stay there and let sleep blot it all out.

One morning he says, when Aziraphale asks if he's coming downstairs, "Nah, too cold. I think I'll just stay in bed. Sleep a bit more." He pulls the covers up around his ears.

"Alright," says Aziraphale, bending down with his hand on Crowley's shoulder, kissing his eyebrow, the only bit of him still accessible, "sleep well, my love."

Crowley hums his agreement as Aziraphale lifts his hand and turns away, closing the door with a soft click. He listens to his feet going down the stairs, slow and steady. The walls of the cottage are thick, he can't really hear, but imagines he can, water running, the kettle being set on the hob, whistling as it comes to a boil, the rattle of a mug, the clink of a teaspoon stirring sugar into tea. He is sliding into sleep when the bed dips. He can smell Aziraphale's tea: strong and milky and sweet; listens to him sip it quietly and then set the mug back down with a little sigh, a tiny exhalation of satisfaction; hears him reading, the rustle of pages being turned. Feels Aziraphale's hand in his hair and cannot resist turning slightly into the touch.

"Sleep well, my love, my Crowley," Aziraphale says, and so Crowley does.

But it's not like before Aziraphale, when Crowley could lose days, weeks, months, years. When he wakes the light is dim and blue and Aziraphale is gone. Crowley thinks he'll just turn over and go back to sleep, but Aziraphale's side of the bed is cold, and it's lonely up here, by himself.

Lonely. 

They were both lonely, before. Both alone. He used to sit in his flat sometimes and wonder what Aziraphale was doing, if he'd bought a long-desired book, perhaps one of the misprint Bibles he was always hunting down; if he'd found a new sushi place, if he'd had his hair cut, if he'd made a friend. He'd bash about his flat, drinking too much, shouting at his plants, thinking up elaborate schemes, anything to fill the hours, overwhelm the silence. And he always wondered if Aziraphale was lonely too. But he had books — collecting them, reading them; and good deeds — fun to do, made you feel happy afterwards. Surely he had no reason to be lonely.

But of course he was. Just as lonely as Crowley. Happier, maybe, but lonely. He’s told Crowley how lonely he was. Crowley thinks of Aziraphale downstairs in their home, alone, while he’s up here, alone. He thinks about that and gets out of bed. There’s a pair of his jeans slung over the chair in the corner, and a cardigan of Aziraphale’s on the end of the bed. Crowley pulls them on and goes downstairs. Aziraphale is sitting on the sofa with a book open, but he’s not reading it. The light here is dim and blue too. Aziraphale is looking at the window across the room, but Crowley doesn’t think he is looking out at the world. His eyes are unfocused, he’s looking inward. Crowley sits down on the sofa, slipping into the dent he’s been making for decades. 

"Here you are," he says, softly.

"Here I am." Aziraphale falls short of the bright tone he was no doubt hoping for.

"Sorry I left you all alone."

"Nonsense, my dear. You need your sleep and I have plenty to keep me busy."

"I like my sleep, but you know I don’t need it, any more than you do." He settles even deeper into the sofa and leans against Aziraphale, reaching for his hand. "I used to sleep for ages, to escape things I didn't want to face, to stop thinking thoughts I didn’t want to think." He brings their joined hands to his mouth and presses his lips to Aziraphale’s knuckles."I don’t want to leave you alone, in our home, alone and feeling blue."

Aziraphale huffs an almost-laugh, just a puff of air across Crowley’s skin.

"I was feeling a little blue. I suppose it’s not having anything to really do, now the unpacking is done. I think I miss the shop, a bit. I’d just started to enjoy selling books."

"You see, that’s what I was afraid of, when you agreed to move here. That you’d miss it more than you imagined you would. You gave up too much for me."

"Crowley!" Aziraphale’s voice is sharp. "I don’t regret coming here. I love it here, I love our home. It’s an adjustment, that’s all. I’d been in that bookshop for centuries, it was time for a change."

"It is very quiet here, though, isn’t it? I miss all the people busy with their lives. I didn’t know them, didn’t even want to, but I liked seeing them."

"Yes."

"And it’s bloody cold!" He looks down at his feet, bare on the rug, and pulls them up under him.

Aziraphale glances at the cold hearth. "We could—"

Crowley shudders, shakes his head. "No! Angel, no fire. I can’t …"

"Oh, my darling! I’m so sorry, how thoughtless of me. Of course we don’t need a fire. I shall just get another cardigan or two, wool socks, that sort of thing. Enough cardigans for both of us," he says, with a sly glance at Crowley, who has pulled the too-big garment tightly around himself.

"I don’t want my own cardigan," says Crowley. "This one smells like you." He turns his face to bury his nose in the wool of it and twists on the sofa so he can slip his chilled toes under Aziraphale’s warm thigh.

"We’ll get used to living here. Get prepared for the weather. Go for tramps in the countryside," says Aziraphale, sounding doubtful.

"Tramps in the countryside?" 

Aziraphale tries to look offended at Crowley’s teasing tone. "Rambles, hikes, walks, whatever you want to call them."

Crowley wiggles his toes. "And then there’s tea shops in Brighton. Wine bars. Quaint restaurants."

"We never managed that, the first time."

"We were rather occupied." Crowley’s voice is suddenly rough and his breath feels short.

Aziraphale blushes, just the tips of his ears and his cheekbones, and slips his hand between Crowley’s raised knees, down along his inseam. Crowley lets his knees fall open, an invitation Aziraphale accepts, leaning into the space, his hands braced on Crowley’s chest.

"Come here, angel." Crowley lies back, and Aziraphale follows until he’s lying on him, all his warmth and weight and softness.  _ Why have we never had sex on the sofa before? _

Crowley tips his head back, offering Aziraphale his throat and shivering with pleasure at the touch of his soft mouth. 

They’ve both been so focused on settling in and discovering their new home that they’ve rather forgotten this — this discovery of each other, and of their humanish bodies, all the ways to give and receive pleasure. All the different pleasures: the soft ones; the sharp; the longed-for, long-dreamt-of; the unexpected never-considered-for-a-moment.

Crowley had longed forever to be held by Aziraphale, to lean into his softness, but he hadn’t really expected his strength, the way Aziraphale had lifted him effortlessly when his legs would have given way under him that very first time. He had dreamed of his mouth, warm and pink, but had not imagined how much he would like the stinging bruises that soft mouth could mark him with. He certainly had not expected how much Aziraphale — kind, gentle, bashful Aziraphale — would like placing those marks. 

He hadn’t known, had resisted discovering, how the act of revealing himself — of showing Aziraphale the flawed reality of his corporation, the indelible marks of his shame — would come to be profoundly liberating, how having nothing left to hide from Aziraphale, who loved him because of, not despite, everything that had shaped him, would lift the burden he carried so long he had almost — almost — stopped noticing it.

Now he discovers something else: the awkwardness, the almost discomfort of this — Aziraphale’s knee is digging into his thigh, his neck is at a weird angle, his hair is snagged on something — is wonderfully, deliciously maddening. Crowley can’t catch his breath between his gasps — "Ah! Ah!" — his hips are thrusting up to meet every downward thrust of Aziraphale’s, his spine is arching up off the sagging cushions … and then "Oh!" "Oh!" they are both overcome, undone, overtaken, surprised by the joy of the unexpected.

"Fuck!"

"Goodness!"

Aziraphale's eyes are sparkling, he is flushed — Crowley can't see, but he can picture how far that flush washes over Aziraphale's chest — his mouth is stretched wide in a smile that mixes delight with tenderest fondness. The grin Crowley can feel on his own hot face matches Aziraphale's for radiance, he's sure. And then they are both laughing, Aziraphale collapsed on Crowley's chest, pressing his face into his neck, his hot breath gusting across Crowley's damp skin; Crowley's arms wrapped around Aziraphale tight tight tight, his head thrown back.

He didn’t see the stars, didn’t shout across the void. It was just them, here in this place, this mundane everyday place, this worn sofa that has seen so much of them together over the years, this room they are just beginning to make their own. This place they are just beginning to settle into, where they are just beginning to learn the difficulties that are part of this new life they are making, after everything they have ever known has fallen away. Just them, in their humanish bodies, grounded by the slight discomfort, kept present by the surprise. Crowley wouldn't have thought he could be tipped over into orgasm so quickly, just by friction, in their clothes, together!

Slowly, their laughter subsides, and Aziraphale lifts his face and Crowley twists his neck into a less awkward position. Aziraphale makes as if to sit up, but Crowley doesn’t want to let him go, could spend all night on this sofa, blanketed by his softness. Aziraphale lays his head on Crowley's chest, and Crowley tips his head to lean his cheek against Aziraphale’s curls and lets himself drift.

Until the very mundane reality of his body asserts itself: sticky and cooling fast. He could clean them as he has done before, with a little brush of magic, but he wants something else, something he's not quite sure how to ask for, something to keep him, to keep them, in this very corporeal moment.

"Angel," he starts, and then he stops. Will this disgust Aziraphale, what he wants? This base desire? 

"What is it, my love?" Aziraphale moves to the side, off Crowley, and he doesn’t want him to go, but if he shifts a bit more this way, and twists his hips like so, and shimmies back a bit … now Aziraphale is looking up at Crowley, and Crowley moves his hands to Aziraphale’s fly, and opens the buttons, one by one … Aziraphale’s brows draw together in a tiny questioning frown, but he doesn’t try to stop Crowley and his trousers are open and Crowley gets a hand in, slipping his fingers across the silk, slick with Aziraphale’s come, and he lifts them to his mouth, drags them across his lips, tasting Aziraphale’s release — salty-bitter, sea-briny. Aziraphale’s eyes widen as Crowley bends to put his tongue on that stain, and pulls his pants down, and licks him clean. Aziraphale's hand is on Crowley’s head, the lightest of touches. Crowley lifts his face, looks up at Aziraphale. "Thank you," he says, as he always does when Aziraphale has let him take something new that he desires. Aziraphale smiles, soft, hazy. Crowley rests his head against Aziraphale’s thigh, drawn up to brace himself on the edge of the sofa. He is dizzy with the scent swirling around him in that private space, warm and somehow animal. Aziraphale’s fingers push into Crowley’s hair and neither of them looks away. 

Night has fallen, and the room is shadowy, but the wind has blown the clouds away and the light of a full moon lies across the floor. Crowley has never needed light to see Aziraphale, anyway.

At last, Aziraphale says, soft: "Wouldn’t you like to go to bed? Come to bed with me. Come and bathe, and then sleep."

_ So Aziraphale still feels dirty. _ The thought must show in his eyes, because Aziraphale says, "It isn’t that. You know how much I love a bath."

Crowley can’t deny this: for all that he never bothered before Brighton, Aziraphale now adores a bath, lounging in hot, scented water until his skin is rosy and beginning to wrinkle, half-asleep with his arms around Crowley, or leaning against Crowley. He doesn’t bathe alone. And he likes to have his hair washed, not for cleanliness, as such, he never needed it before, but for the pure sensual pleasure of it, the scent of the shampoo, Crowley’s fingers scrubbing at his scalp, the water poured over his head. Crowley has always liked a bath, lying in the water, drifting, not really thinking, the room fogged with steam. And warm water soothes him when his scales start to itch as they sometimes do.

Aziraphale sits up, and stands, and reaches for Crowley’s hand, and they go up the stairs, and undress while the bath fills, each on their own side of the bed, watching, but not needing to touch. Crowley folds Aziraphale’s cardigan carefully, and tosses his jeans at the chair. In the bathroom, Aziraphale pours his favourite lavender oil into the water and gets in first: he wants to hold Crowley. Crowley joins him and leans against him, bracketed by Aziraphale’s legs, his hands wrapped around his ankles, his head pillowed on Aziraphale’s shoulder, both of them wholly content. They are quiet, until Aziraphale says, his voice dreamy: "Frottage."

"What?"

"Frottage. What we did downstairs: frottage. One of the young men at that club in the 1890s told me how it was all he could do with another man most of the time. When there was nowhere private to go, they would do it up against a tree on Hampstead Heath."

"I liked it," says Crowley. "I liked the surprise of it. I mean, I really like it when I can see and touch every inch of you, and take our time, but I wasn’t expecting to … you know. It was a fantastic surprise. Frottage," he repeats, tipping his head back and kissing the secret spot beneath the hinge of Aziraphale's jaw. "I'll look out for a tree when we go for a tramp."

Aziraphale laughs, a fond chuckle. "For a ramble." He trails his fingers up Crowley's chest.

"It felt very … human," Crowley says, "Less … æthereal. Just us, on the sofa. Different. Hard to explain."

"Yes, just us. Private."

Crowley hardly ever dared let himself dream of this, it seemed so impossible to even imagine what they have now — their own home, a private place just for them, where, so far at least, they are being left alone by both sides. He wonders why he felt so at odds with himself that sleeping the day away seemed to be an answer, when his comfort is here, in Aziraphale’s arms.

"’Ziraphale," he says, tilting his head back so he is whispering into Aziraphale’s skin, "I want to live here with you."

And Aziraphale understands what he means. "We’ll make it our home, we’ll settle and be comfortable here together, my darling."

"Yes," he sighs, and laces his fingers together with Aziraphale’s, "but you know how I get, all itchy."

Aziraphale turns his head and kisses the side of Crowley’s face, right on the mark of the serpent. "I know," he says, and he doesn’t have to say anything more, it’s enough.


	6. Storms

The sound of something banging wakes him and Aziraphale lies in the darkness frowning, trying to puzzle it out. It’s quiet in the countryside — no traffic, no car horns and sirens, no people walking past calling to each other in late-night-after-the-pub voices — but it’s also full of sounds he had grown unused to — pleasant sounds of birdsong and the breeze sighing through branches, and less pleasant sounds of twigs scratching at the windows, the whine of the wind round the corners of their exposed house. And now something banging: crack-clap! clap-crack! There is so very much wind out here on the side of a hill, in sight of the sea.

He lies in the darkness listening to the noise and feeling more and more unsettled. Crowley has turned his back to Aziraphale in sleep, and it doesn’t mean anything, but he feels alone. It has taken some getting used to, sleeping. At first, he was exhausted by all the newly allowed terrifying emotion and almost-too-much sensation and slipped under easily, overwhelmed by Crowley’s closeness. After a time, he regained his equilibrium, but didn’t want to leave Crowley, to get out of his bed and sit alone with a book. So he learned to sleep by lying in the darkness and letting himself drift, listening to Crowley’s breath, running the tips of his fingers across Crowley’s skin, or threading them through his hair, mesmerising himself until he fell. But he has not yet learned to sleep long. He wakes before Crowley in the mornings, and he often wakes in the dark. It’s different tonight, he didn’t just wake, he was woken by this noise — crack-clap! clap-crack! — he can’t place. He is not frightened, it is only a noise, but his spine is stiffening and his jaw is tightening and he is not breathing.

"Angel?" Crowley’s voice is smudged around the edges. "’Zirapha’e? Why … why’re you awake?"

He turns over towards Aziraphale, brushes his hand down the side of his face.

"That noise … can you hear it? It woke me."

Crowley leans up on an elbow and tilts his head, listening. "Oh, that," he says, "I think it’s the door of the shed. I saw the latch was coming off, it must have been torn open." He gestures and the banging stops. 

"Did you just fix it?"

"Wedged a stone in front of it." 

"Thank you. That was clever."

"C'm'here." Crowley wriggles closer, reaching for Aziraphale. "I could feel how stiff you are." His voice is quiet, but Aziraphale easily hears it above the sound of the wind, still loud even without the banging.

"You could? But you were all the way—"

"I can always sense you, especially this close." Crowley's tone is the one that he uses with his "what do you take me for?" expression. Which Aziraphale can't see, with his face pressed against Crowley's shoulder, just where he needs to be. He lies in Crowley’s arms, soothed by the hand moving gently on his back, and feels himself relax as Crowley slides back into sleep, his grip loosening just a little. 

He believes what he said to Crowley the other day, the day Crowley was low and unsettled and slept for long hours, that they will learn to be comfortable here. But Crowley wasn’t alone in needing to hear that, so he tells himself again as he lies in the dark, wrapped in Crowley’s warmth, that they will settle and find their places, find their purpose here.

And before he knows it, the early light creeps in the window, grey and subdued, but the wind has stilled and Aziraphale is wrapped in Crowley’s arms.

"Good morning, my love," he says to the still-sleeping Crowley.

"Mmmph," Crowley replies, his arms tightening.

"I’ve been thinking, and I think we are a little bored here. We should get out more. What about a drive? Take me to Brighton, darling?"

"Course, angel, anywhere you want to go." Crowley’s voice is still sleep-hazy and Aziraphale isn’t sure he’s actually awake, but he can wait. He wriggles a bit until he can reach the night stand, where there’s a book, and his spectacles, and turns a bit so he can read, while staying close. He’s happily at sea with dear Jack and Stephen when Crowley says, his voice still morning-rough but fully awake: "We’d better get up if we want to make a day of it."

"Crowley!" 

"The tea shops of Brighton await us. And the bookstores."

"And the sea shore."

"The wine merchants."

"We  _ are _ running a little low."

"Can’t have that."

"No, that would never do."

And then Crowley is leaning on an elbow, smiling down at Aziraphale: his sun has come up.

Aziraphale hums under his breath as he dresses, putting on a tie for the first time in weeks (Crowley pouts a little as he knots the bow), watching as Crowley shimmies into skinny trousers rather than the looser jeans he’s been wearing out in the garden and sits down to put on his boots, the ones with a small heel that make his hips sway even more — town clothes. They really have let themselves become positively rustic. 

There’s a mist clinging to the hedgerows as they drive down the lane, but there’s a little blue in the sky between torn clouds. Aziraphale reaches for Crowley’s hand once they're out of the rutted track and their eyes meet briefly. "A day at the seaside."

"S’pose we should have gone when the weather was still good."

"We’re going now. It will be lovely. Thank you, Crowley."

It is good to be out, the sky opening up even bigger, scraps of cloud chasing each other in the breeze, sunlight dancing over the turf. Crowley winds his window down, although the day is chilly. He’s left his hair loose, and the rushing air lifts it. 

Aziraphale is seized by the sharpest memory of Crowley, his hair tossed by the wind that preceded that dreadful deluge sent to drown the disobedient world. How anguished he had been when Aziraphale had told him what was about to happen. He hates to recall how unquestioning he himself had been, how little he’d really cared about all those lost humans. He’d been on Earth as long as Crowley, but he had not yet come to really appreciate them. Crowley had always been far more interested in them. Cast out from Heaven, and hardly at home among the denizens of Hell, he’d taken to humans far more quickly. Just look at the business with the tree of knowledge of good and evil — he'd given them something invaluable, something precious, something Heaven never would have offered, something Heaven did not want its own to have, let alone humans. And God? Crowley was always part of God's intention, and Aziraphale firmly believes God approved, or came to approve.

"You’ve always loved them," Aziraphale says.

"What?" Crowley looks at him for a long moment, unnerving him a bit, even though he knows Crowley will never crash.

"Humans. You’ve always loved them."

The Crowley of before would have scoffed, denied it, pretended to be outraged, even angry — like that day in the former convent. The Crowley of now simply shrugs. "Interesting, ingenious. I like them. In general, you understand. Can’t get close to them —" regret passes across his face, clear to see even though he’s wearing dark glasses. He shakes his head, as if to chase away unwanted recollections. "Dangerous to try to get close. Paid the price for that often enough in the early days. It would all be going fine, then one day, a few cups of wine, I’d forget myself, look straight at them, they’d really see the eyes and make their excuses. Took me a while to finally learn that lesson." His mood has shifted, darkened.

"I shouldn’t have—"

"No, don’t. You’re right. Down Below loathed it, couldn’t understand it. Why did I like them at their best, why didn’t I relish their evil and self-destruction? That lot never understood humans at all."

"Bit like Upstairs. They looked down on humans—" Crowley snorts a laugh "—oh, yes, haha; but they did. It’s part of why they thought I was such a failure, because I found I liked them, too. Liked so many of the things they do."

"Like dessert."

"Sushi."

"Books."

"Yes. Stories. They way they create other worlds."

"Art." Crowley turns to Aziraphale again. "Been a while since you drew anything."

"I only had one subject. And now I have you with me always." Crowley has turned back to the road, but Aziraphale sees his face soften and a flush rise up his neck.

"But wouldn’t you like to do it again? You could draw anything you wanted. Landscapes, plants." He clears his throat. "I’ll pose for you again, if you want." He takes his hand off the steering wheel and reaches for Aziraphale’s. "If you want," he repeats, voice much quieter.

"My darling, of course. Thank you, I’d be honoured to." The corner of Crowley’s mouth tilts up and Aziraphale gives his hand a squeeze. 

They’ve reached the seafront; Crowley parks the Bentley and comes round to open Aziraphale's door, holding out a hand in the way that always makes him feel special — more than special, cared for. Thinking of Heaven’s judgment and how he had always fallen short in their eyes makes such care even more precious — he has never fallen short in Crowley’s eyes.

"Walk along the promenade, angel?"

"Yes, please."

They hold hands as they walk. It’s out of season, of course, so they have the seafront almost to themselves.

"Was there anyone, that you—"

"No. I told you that, long ago. There was never anyone. Only you, angel."

"No, I didn’t mean like that. I didn’t doubt what you told me. I only meant, was there someone, among all of them, who you liked the most. That you got to know, despite …" He’s not sure how to phrase it. "Despite—"

"My handicap?"

"Despite their prejudice. There’s not one thing wrong with you, my darling."

"In your eyes."

Aziraphale purses his lips, he doesn’t want to argue the point. Crowley does believe him now, he just defaults into his long-held self-image sometimes. But Crowley smiles, conceding.

"Leonardo was a lovely chap."

"Da Vinci?"

"Brilliant bugger. And brave. Didn’t give a toss what people thought. Didn’t flinch, either." He gestures towards his eyes.

"You let him see you?" He feels a tremendous surge of tenderness. "Crowley, I’m so glad there was someone, that you could let your guard down with someone."

"Yeah. Bit hard to keep it up, when he’d been talking a mile a minute all night, topping up my glass, letting the candles go all smoky. The first time, I did it without thinking, just took them off. He noticed, I could see he did, but he didn’t even pause."

"He had an eye for beauty."

"Well yes … but he was curious, voracious for knowledge, so full of ideas. And he didn't judge. He was interested in everything, and everyone."

"No wonder you liked him."

"I'm fortunate to have known him."

"Did he ever draw you?"

"Yes, he was brilliant. But he saw less than you, angel. He saw what I let him, perhaps a bit more. But you see everything. Even the parts I tried not to show."

"Well, I have been at it forever, so it’s no wonder."

"I have no secrets from you." Crowley lowers his glasses and looks at Aziraphale with utter openness. Aziraphale’s breath stutters. He may never be unaffected by the full beam of Crowley’s regard. He hopes he never will be.

The torn clouds have thickened while they have been walking, the sky’s blue veiled. The wind has risen again; Aziraphale shivers.

"Bloody chilly in this sea breeze," says Crowley. "Let’s find a tea shop, get some cake in you. It’s a terribly long time since you ate cake."

"Terribly," Aziraphale agrees. They quicken their steps and spy a likely looking place, setting the bell over the door jangling as they enter. 

The cafe does carrot cake, big slices topped with sticky icing. Crowley doesn’t want any, of course; he drinks coffee and watches Aziraphale eat, accepting a taste — "Too sweet for me" — his mouth quirking in a little private smile.

"This is your kink, isn’t it?" Aziraphale says, licking the last of the icing off the cake fork and setting it down. 

Crowley splutters.

"Angel! My kink?" He is scarlet. "What do you know about kinks?"

Aziraphale smiles. It was a risqué thing to say, but he couldn’t help it — the way Crowley has always watched him eat cake; now he thinks about it, the way Crowley gave him that pear and helped him eat it.

Then Crowley grins and shrugs. "Yeah, I s’pose it is. Pretty innocent, as kinks go."

"Yes, you’re a terrible demon, my dear."

"Bookshop next?" Crowley asks, as Aziraphale sets his napkin next to his plate. "There’s a good one not far off. Antiquarian."

"How do you …?" The question dies on Aziraphale’s tongue as Crowley holds up his phone. "You do spoil me, darling." Crowley just grins again.

The wind off the sea is almost a gale when they step out, whipping Crowley’s hair across his face, stinging their cheeks. It’s an awful day to be on the seafront, but he doesn’t care. It’s not the worst they’ve experienced together, and this is Crowley’s treat to him, tea and cake and a bookshop. 

The way the bell chimes when they open the door gives him a brief pang for his own shop, and the smell of crumbling bindings is so powerfully familiar he stops and closes his eyes and just breathes it in.

"Angel, we don’t have to stay," Crowley says quietly next to him, "I thought you’d like … I thought you might find something you don’t have, but it’s just a reminder of what I made you give up."

"My dear, no. It’s awfully familiar, that’s all."

"Painfully familiar."

"I won’t deny that it is a little odd to be in this sort of shop when it isn’t my own. I do miss it, and I do feel a bit adrift. Just as you do, my dear, without all our old familiar routines. But we want new things now, not our old familiar routines. And maybe I will find a treasure." He glances out of the window, it has now begun to rain. "Besides, it’s terrible out there, we should stay here in the dry for a while at least, now that we’re here."

Crowley doesn’t look completely convinced. "Well, if you’re sure. But tell me as soon as you want to leave, angel. I’ll go fetch the car, you won’t have to get wet."

Now that he's got over the first sting of recognition and regret, it is wonderful to be surrounded by so many unknown volumes and he soon loses himself among the shelves, picking up one book after another. He’s not looking for anything in particular and in fact the shop seems more focused on local history and natural sciences — there is a beautiful volume with delicate watercolours of local wild plants — than the sort of esoterica he used to hunt out. But the truth is, Aziraphale likes books, and his tastes are not nearly as elevated as a brief glance might suggest. He likes books and he likes stories, and because he first had a shop when even the latest novels were bound in leather, his shelves can seem terribly serious to the casual eye, but anyone who spent any time really looking would see more stories than they might expect. So when he turns a corner and emerges from the sciences into the fiction, Aziraphale feels more at home. Crowley is off somewhere — he glances up and sees him staring out of the window at the rain lashing down. His shoulders are hunched against the chill from the glass and the draught under the door and Aziraphale’s chest tightens with love. This whole outing is so carefully tailored to his tastes, tea and cake and books, when Crowley would likely be far happier at home in his warm conservatory, or in a pub with a fine single malt, or driving too fast on an open road. His eyes are a little misty, Crowley’s outline wobbles as he turns to look at Aziraphale, his eyes inscrutable of course, but fondness in the set of his mouth. He crosses the shop in a few strides of those long legs.

"What is it, angel? Found a prize?"

"Oscar." He looks down at the book in his hand:  _ The Selfish Giant _ , his favourite of dear Oscar’s. He already owns an infinitely precious copy, of course, one with a particular place in their story together. "I think he was for me a little like Leonardo was for you. So clever and brave, and very kind, in his way. But so foolish, the dear man. That boy Bosie did not deserve him."

"It’s like that sometimes."

Aziraphale returns the book to the shelf. "Shall we go home, or would you prefer to walk more?" The rain seems to have eased, no longer streaking the window. 

"Not really a day for strolling."

"There will be plenty of other days." He takes Crowley’s hand. "This was a lovely outing. Thank you, my dearest." Crowley looks dubious. "The weather doesn’t matter a bit to me, but I saw you looking positively chilled, just looking out at it."

"The funny thing is, I almost do want to be out in it, getting buffeted and chilled and soaked."

"Battling the elements?"

"Don't know what's come over me." He shivers theatrically. "But I'll go get the car, you stay here and browse a bit more."

"Well, if you insist. I think I will buy something. There's a book on the local flora. We should get to know our new home."

The smile Crowley gives him is unfair. He shouldn't have to cope with that sort of thing in public.

As they drive up to their little house in its neatened garden, Aziraphale says: "I think it's all a bit tame for you. You're not one for staying at home. You need to be doing something. You shouldn't be cooped up listening to me turning pages all day."

"I like listening to you turning pages."

"But not all day, every day."

Crowley frowns, but doesn't say anything.

Much later, lying in bed, listening to the wind, he says: "I think you have a point."

"You've always liked a project."

"Don't want to do that anymore, and now the garden's all tidied away, I am a bit … bored. Not with you! Never with you!"

Aziraphale tightens his arm around Crowley, but he doesn't say anything, mindful of something Crowley said ages ago, in their room above the bookshop. He didn't want Aziraphale to try to fix things then.

"I'll have a look at your flower book, but it’s not the right time for finding plants. Maybe I’ll just go and get the lay of the land. Spy out some picnic spots for you. Should be worth a few days, at least."

Aziraphale hums in agreement, feeling himself drifting into sleep. "Thank you for my treat today, my dearest," he says.

Crowley snorts softly. "Just indulging my kink, angel."

Their outing was lovely, and now Aziraphale feels more comfortable staying in and reading, but he does miss what the bookshop had finally started to be for him: a way to share his favourites, finding just the right book for each person drawn to the shop by a particular need.

The sound of the pages turning is loud in the empty house: Crowley has done what he said he might, and gone out, "for a tramp", although the weather is windy and unpredictable. 

"You don’t have to come, angel," he said, pulling on a waxed jacket and knitted cap, pushing his feet into stout boots (all mysteriously waiting for him in the hall). Aziraphale takes the offered hint, Crowley is asking for space without asking.

"Enjoy your tramp, my dear," Aziraphale said, waving him off from the doorstep before settling himself with a mug of tea and a book.

The sound of the pages turning is loud in the empty house — until he is disturbed by the sound of a car on the gravel drive, followed by a knock. He marks his place and goes to the door. They don’t get visitors, not since Marjorie Care brought them biscuits on their first day.

It’s her again, smiling as he opens the door.

"Hello," he says, trying to sound more welcoming than puzzled.

"Hello, Mr Fell," she says, "Marjorie Care. We’ve met before."

"Yes, of course. Your biscuits were delicious, thank you. I should have returned the tin."

"Oh, don’t worry about that." She smiles and the wind lifts her short grey hair from her forehead.

Aziraphale steps back, swinging the door wide. "Forgive my lack of manners, won’t you come in?" Inviting a visitor into one’s home is rather different from greeting a shop customer.

"I hope I’m not intruding, Mr Fell," she says, stepping in and looking around the hall. "William Gladwish told me you used to be a bookseller." She takes off her bright patchwork coat and hangs it on one of the wall hooks, then turns to face him again. "Don’t worry! We’re not gossiping about you, but we like to know our neighbours, in a village. William told me, because I run the local library. Well, ‘library’," she continues, placing the word inside quotes, "It’s some shelves of books in the village hall, but we are expanding, and William thought you might be interested, seeing as you used to sell books."

"Interested?" Aziraphale leads her into the sitting room, not quite sure what she’s getting at. Does she want a donation, some of his books? "Please, won’t you sit down, while I go and make tea?"

"Thank you," says Marjorie Care, "that would be lovely."

Aziraphale goes into the kitchen and puts the kettle on, distracting himself from the slight panic of a stranger in the house, their house, when he’s alone. Perhaps she saw Crowley leave and took the chance to catch him on his own? But she doesn’t seem anything other than a pleasant, public-spirited woman with an unconventional dress sense. 

Marjorie Care is perusing his shelves when he carries the tea tray through. "No biscuits, I’m afraid," he says, "I’m no baker!" He sounds flustered and nervous to his own ears. Which is ridiculous, Marjorie Care hasn’t come to find him wanting, catalogue his shortcomings, deal out threats wrapped in silk. He sets the tray down and … sort of hovers, until his visitor turns from the books, smiles, and sits in Crowley’s favourite armchair. 

"What a splendid collection you have," she says, as Aziraphale pours the tea.

"Oh, well, I’ve been gathering books for rather a long time, you see."

"But you gave up your shop?"

He can imagine what she’s thinking: he’s not really old enough to have amassed all these, surely, and why would he retire to the country with this huge library of rarities? Oh dear, he’s not very good at this anymore! Teach him to tease Crowley over "one careful owner", it’s the truth about so many of his books, and would make even less sense to an outsider.

"Well, Crowley thought … that is to say … we thought we would like a quieter life, for a while, away from London, you see. And the area around my shop had rather gone down, over the years …" He trails off. 

"Might you open a shop again, do you think? Or perhaps you’ll sell online. I gather that’s the way to go, these days, for dealers in rarities."

"Well, perhaps," he says. "Won’t you tell me about your library?" He hopes he doesn’t sound too rude, changing the subject so abruptly, but that’s why she’s here, after all, isn’t it? And he can hardly be expected to talk about "online". Crowley would probably know what she means, but Aziraphale doesn’t. 

"Just a few shelves in the village hall, at the moment," says Marjorie Care, "It’s iniquitous what the county council cuts have done to libraries. So a few of us thought we’d set one up ourselves. To be honest, it helps to have some way of shifting books you aren’t likely to reread out of the house. Makes me feel less indulgent about my book habit, Mr Fell. Though I’m an amateur compared to you!" She sets her teacup down and looks around at his shelves again. 

"I, um, inherited some of them," Aziraphale fibs, "and I’m rather good at estate sales, you see. Lucky, I’ve been very lucky, found some real gems." He hopes she hasn’t seen the Shakespeares, which would really be rather hard to explain away. And Heaven forbid she looked inside and found a drawing of Crowley on the flyleaf of a first folio. His heart does its familiar wobbly squeeze at the thought of that beloved sketch.

"William thought you might have some books to donate, but I can see you didn’t have that sort of shop. And now you really will think we’ve been gossiping. I’m afraid you will find our village ways a bit different to what you have been used to, in London. Not much anonymity in a village. But please don’t think we want to pry! It’s lovely someone saved this place before it fell to ruin, and the garden!"

"No, no," says Aziraphale, "we don't, think that. Everyone has been so welcoming. We've been rather absorbed with settling in; we haven't meant to be standoffish, I hope people don't think that. But you are right, it is rather different to the life we had in London." If only she knew how very different indeed, he thinks, a little wildly. 

"I'll have a look for books that might be … suitable for your library, Mrs Care. Not all my books are like this." He looks fondly at his shelves, the leather bindings gleaming — brown and buff and deep red, green and dark blue, their gold lettering sparkling. He loves how his oldest books look, solid and dignified, and to look at these shelves, you'd never guess he would find any pleasure in modern paperbacks with their bright covers and fanciful lettering, but he learnt long long ago not to judge a book by its cover. Just look at Gabriel, then look at Crowley.

"Angel, you still in there with a book?" Crowley's voice floats into the sitting room from the hall, where he's evidently stripping off his outdoor things. "You were right, a tramp was just what I needed, blew the cobwebs right away. Almost blew me away too—" He stops in the doorway. "Hello," he says.

"This is Marjorie Care," says Aziraphale, "Mrs Care, my—" he hesitates over the next word "—partner, Anthony Crowley." He can feel a flush rising up his neck. He’s never used the term in relation to Crowley in the modern sense.

"Oh, it’s Marjorie, please," she says, not pausing over his momentous word choice, "Hello, may I call you Anthony?"

"Everyone calls me Crowley," he says, "You brought biscuits," he adds, a little at random, glancing at Aziraphale with a questioning look.

"Marjorie runs the village library. She came to talk about books."

"You came to the right place for that," says Crowley with a smile that looks nervous.

Marjorie gets up. "Well, I must be off. The library’s open on Wednesday and Friday afternoons, two until five, if you’d like to come and see it. Thank you so much for the tea and the chat. And a glimpse of your treasures."

"It was lovely to get to know you," says Aziraphale, "I will certainly visit you at the library." They walk her to the door and as they stand there together, Aziraphale feels choked with gratitude that this is what they have now.

"Partner?" Crowley turns to him, hand up to take off his glasses, so Aziraphale can see how his eyes gleam with mischief. "Not 'associate'?"

Aziraphale swats him on the arm. "Not like that. In the modern sense. I could hardly say 'boyfriend'. That's just … it's too … it's not … it's not dignified. It sounds … impermanent, temporary. Easy come, easy go."

Crowley is looking at him with a saltwater shine in his beautiful eyes. "Angel," he says, "angel." His hands are on Aziraphale's shoulders, pulling him closer. "It wasn't easy," he says, low, fierce, "and I'm not going anywhere." The last word is vehement, whispered into Aziraphale's mouth.

"Good," he answers, returning Crowley's breath, and then there are no more words and they are pressed together in the doorway of their home, in the early dusk, kissing as if they are starving for each other.

This afternoon is the longest they have been apart, truly physically apart, since they moved here and finally, definitively declared themselves an "us". And now Aziraphale has declared it out loud, to a human. To a friend. Has declared it to this place.

Much, much later, lying in their blue bed, Crowley's hair spilling down his back and across Aziraphale's chest as they slowly return to the here and the now, to their corporeal selves — having come straight upstairs, stripping each other of clothing on the stairs, across the landing, all the way to the bed, urgent with the need to be even closer, closer, closest — Crowley murmurs: "Partners. 'S right. We've been partners for a long time. Modern sense's good, too. Nothing temp'ry ..." His voice has gone soft around the edges. 

"Nothing temporary," Aziraphale agrees, pressing his mouth into Crowley's hair.

He never said it, while they were buying the house, not explicitly. He thinks the agent assumed, and they did nothing to deny it, but he's never said it, out loud. Crowley is right, ever since they came to their Arrangement, they've been partners. In crime, he thinks, plucking a phrase he's read somewhere, feeling his mouth twitch into a smile; both sides probably regarded it as a crime. Partners in raising Warlock, partners in stopping the march of time. Nothing the least bit temporary about their partnership. 

He tightens his arms around Crowley and closes his eyes and watches scenes from their partnership unspool across his memory: fleeting, few and far between at first, and then denser and denser, tight packed, until now, in their present, it's one long uninterrupted scene. He can't see into the future, but he is certain what it holds. 

He doesn't see it when it happens, but he hears it, or rather its absence. The wind dies completely away, the clouds roll back, moonlight — and starshine — bathe them in silver.

The storms are gone. For now.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> "dear Jack and Stephen" are Jack Aubrey and Stephen Maturin, a naval captain and a physician in the early 1800s who are friends and partners (though not in the modern sense, canonically) over many decades and through all manner of adventures across 20 books by Patrick O'Brian. They're my favourite books, and I think Aziraphale would like them very much too.


	7. Black and white

"Saw something that made me think of you," Crowley says one morning, still lying in bed while Aziraphale dresses, his hands behind his head, sharp elbows sticking out, hair a crazy tumble on the pillow, eyes following Aziraphale’s hands as he buttons his shirt and then his waistcoat, as he reaches for his thick cardigan. 

"On a tramp?"

"Yes. Snapped it to show you." He reaches for his phone, thumbs it open and pulls up the picture gallery.

The wisp of white snagged on a stone wall, streaming in the wind, had caught the edge of his vision. "Like his hair. Like a wing." He swore at himself, reflexively, for sentimentality. And then he thought, "So what?" And pulled out his phone and took a picture of the little bit of wool soft and light against the grey roughness.

Aziraphale sits down on the bed and leans against him to look. "You thought of me?" he says, puzzled, not seeing what Crowley saw. 

"Soft and rough," he says, trying to explain.

"Oh," says Aziraphale, voice soft, "Oh my love." He brushes his thumb along Crowley’s thumb. "Oh my Crowley."

Crowley’s heart is too big for his chest. He doesn’t say what he might have only months ago, "It’s nothing, silly really." He doesn’t say anything, just closes his eyes and basks in the warmth of Aziraphale’s love.

Nothing is nothing, really. Everything is something, if you are looking.

And Crowley is looking, more and more. Once he braved it, properly prepared in the sort of clothes he would never have considered as a demon about town with a flash reputation to maintain, he realised he liked it, being out in the weather, buffeted by the wind sweeping in off the sea, sometimes rained on, even chilled. Aziraphale doesn't understand the pull, but he is happy if Crowley is happy, and with Crowley busy, he potters among his books, no longer worrying that he's neglecting Crowley, or boring him.

They have rediscovered the pleasure of being apart — it makes being together fresh again, all the sweeter for being interrupted. Solitude is such a long-held habit that constant togetherness was harder than either of them acknowledged. Until Crowley said, one squally, blustery morning, "I think I'll walk today", and watched a look of dismay cross Aziraphale's face, quickly replaced by acquiescence —"Alright, my dear, would you get me some stout boots?". The relief that followed, when Crowley added: "You don't have to, angel", made him smile. 

"I would, of course I would, if you wanted me to, but I really must try to create some order among the novels, to see what I might offer Marjorie, for the library."

"Giving away books?"

"That's the beauty of a library, I don't know why it didn't occur from the very beginning. I can lend the books, rather than selling them." His expression is such a delightful mixture of smugness and happiness, that Crowley laughs. Aziraphale pretends to pout, but he can't sustain it and laughs too. "It's the perfect solution for a collector such as myself. And a small blessing will preserve the books from harm. Because you know I'd started to enjoy finding just the right book for my customers."

"I do know, angel." Crowley never smiled as much in all his long existence as he has since they became them; the smallest things make him happy, things that used to pierce him with unfulfilled yearning.

He tramps in all weathers, always eager to see: the twist of a branch bent by gales, a curl of rusted wire securing a gate, the sky upside down in a muddy puddle, the ruts in a track shining after rain. He takes pictures and finds he prefers them in black and white — stripped of the distraction of colour they retain only their essence, their bones. He will have colour enough in his garden. 

He brings home what he sees to show Aziraphale, just as he intends to bring him gifts of colour and fragrance and sweetness, when the season turns and the weather warms and his garden awakens. 

Aziraphale looks at them with serious attention, a small frown caught between his brows. "You see beauty where others might see only ugliness, my darling." Crowley knows how he learnt that: in the eyes of an angel who looked at a serpent’s eyes, a serpent’s scales and saw only someone to love — Aziraphale’s purest miracle.

And he begins also to capture glimpses of Aziraphale, pictures he used to hoard in his mind and shuffle through like postcards as he drifted to sleep: glasses slipping down his nose as he sits reading, the bare patches on his ancient waistcoat rubbed of the velvet nap by worrying fingers, his pinky finger against a book, a curl of hair at his neck, his beautiful beloved bare feet.

Aziraphale doesn't appear to notice and Crowley wonders why he doesn't show them to him. Surely he would understand, he has after all captured Crowley in secret — in private — for millennia. 

There is a particular picture he wants to have, one he cannot steal. Aziraphale did not take from Crowley a picture he wanted very badly to make. He waited until Crowley gave it to him. 

He is already in bed as Aziraphale undresses, turning to hang up his shirt and revealing what Crowley wants so badly.

Aziraphale slides under the covers, warmly dressed in flannel pyjamas against the bedroom's chill, and settles along Crowley's side with a contented sigh, the heat of his body soaking into Crowley's skin.

"I have some pictures to show you, if you’d like to see them," Crowley says.

"Always."

"These aren’t of rocks and roots."

"Oh?"

Crowley hands Aziraphale his phone, his mouth suddenly dry, watching his reaction as he looks at the first: him reading, glasses catching the light. He looks puzzled as he swipes through to the next, taken at the same time, his hand holding the book, pinky ring gleaming.

"I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have stolen them."

"Oh, my dear, I knew you were taking pictures, but I thought I would wait until you wanted to show them. After all, I stole pictures of you for a very long time."

The relief that floods Crowley makes him properly aware how nervous he was over this.

Aziraphale studies each picture, but doesn’t comment until he comes to the one of his worn, amply filled waistcoat. "Why take a picture of this old thing?"

"Because it comforts you. You’ve rubbed your fingers over it so much you wore away the fabric." He doesn’t add what he has always thought: "Lucky waistcoat", to be allowed to offer comfort, long before he could.

Aziraphale gives him one of those looks that always stop his breath, filled with aching tenderness. 

"My dearest love." 

He resumes his perusal of the pictures without further comment, only saying as he hands the phone back: "A record of a fussy book lover."

"Excuse me, angel. A record of little things I adore."

"Like my feet?"

Aziraphale’s feet, his toes curling into the thick rug next to the bed. "Well, you could hardly expect me to leave them out, could you?"

"Kinky serpent," Aziraphale teases, wriggling down under the covers. But he adds: "Thank you, for showing me. Thank you for seeing me."

Crowley sets the phone down and flicks off the lamp, sliding down until he can pillow his head on Aziraphale’s chest.

"There’s one I was tempted to snap when you were getting undressed tonight, but there was a picture you didn’t take from me, so I thought I should ask."

"What’s that?" Aziraphale has buried his hands in Crowley’s hair, gently easing the day’s tangles free.

Crowley slips his hand round and up under Aziraphale’s pyjama top, sinking his fingers into the softness above his waist. "This."

"What?"

"This little bit of softness, which I adore."

Aziraphale huffs out a surprised laugh. "Really?"

"Absolutely. You know I love your softness."

"Yes …" 

His hesitation makes Crowley want to grind his molars in frustration, but Aziraphale was patient with him, so he must be too, even though it does not come easy.

"To cuddle up to, perhaps, but why do you want a picture?"

"Because you are beautiful. Every part of you is beautiful. I do love to be surrounded by your lovely flesh, and sink into it, but it’s not only that. I could get that from a pillow. And besides, have you ever really seen this particular bit?"

"Self-regard is wrong."

Crowley snorts. "No one else Up There got that memo. The whole place reeks of self-regard and self improvement — all their perfect tailoring and the rest of it. I don’t pretend to know what God thinks, but I don’t think all their obsessing over how their corporations look—"

"Standards, Gabriel always said. A sloppy corporation shows you’re letting standards slip."

"Sloppy? You? And I know you think that’s bullshit."

"Oh, as far as Gabriel was concerned, I’ve been irredeemable on that front since corporations were distributed. I got such pitying looks! Everyone assumed I’d want to trade it in for a sleeker model—"

"But you didn't, thankfully."

"It was perfectly serviceable."

"Perfectly serviceable? Oh, angel."

Crowley wriggles further down beneath the covers and lifts the hem of Aziraphale's pyjama jacket, so he can kiss his way across his stomach. "Perfectly lovely," he murmurs, into the softness. Aziraphale's hands are still in his hair, cupping the back of his head. Crowley is ridiculously happy.

"Of course you can have whatever picture you would like, darling."

"Thank you." Being able to ask for and be given what you desire, even something odd, is an astonishing gift of love.

The next evening he again watches as Aziraphale undresses, careful with his clothes so they will not be creased, and at the moment he turns to hang up his shirt, Crowley takes the picture he wants — of the small but generous roll that overhangs Aziraphale's belt.

He's looking at it as Aziraphale gets into bed and glances over. "Oh," he says, and there's a small smile curving his mouth. If he thought he was happy last night, that smile makes Crowley happier still, and he understands how Aziraphale felt when he finally looked with less shame at the beautiful drawing of his own back.


	8. Paradise

So the year winds down, with books and Marjorie Care’s library, with walks and pictures, with drives to the sea front and to the pub, with cups of tea and bottles of wine, with nights in their blue bed and afternoons in their slate-grey bed.

The year winds down and the world turns, hard frosts sparkling on each leaf and twig in the garden.

Crowley knows each leaf and twig, watching intently for signs of life in the rich dark damp soil and one day he sees the very first harbinger of the new season. A tiny green thing pushing up from under the leaf mold, like a fingertip held up to test the weather. "Grow fast, grow strong," he tells it. "I need your flowers, whatever you are. We’ve kept him waiting long enough." He watches every day now and soon the fingertip is joined by others, clusters and clumps of them. "Hurry up!" he tells them, picturing their white bells, having consulted the book Aziraphale bought him in the Brighton shop and decided they are probably snowdrops: brave and pale, some of the earliest flowers to emerge, even before spring is really established.

Finally one morning the first buds have opened. He plucks them, just a few slender stalks of unassuming little flowers, and carries them inside, to where Aziraphale is dusting bookshelves in the pale sunshine falling through the sitting room window, unfiltered by the vines whose summer leaves will form a thicket.

Aziraphale turns when he hears Crowley’s steps, and his face lights up when he sees what he is holding out.

"For me?" He reaches for them, gently touches a fingertip to a white petal, the softest of all his soft smiles stealing across his features. "How lovely! Your garden is waking up at last, my darling."

"Soon there'll be flowers every day." Crowley reaches out to touch his own finger to a petal. These shy little flowers aren't the sort of thing he was interested in before. His conservatory is full of dramatic shapes and odd colours, orchids spotted like wild beasts, pitchers waiting for prey, petals in strange shades of brown and almost black, sulphur yellow, electric purple. He has bullied them and loved them and they are more lush now than they have ever been, thriving as Aziraphale predicted under his new kinder care. But these shy little flowers, bravely poking up from the cold winter soil bringing news of spring and more flowers, touch him in a way none of his bold and bizarre blooms has. They’re tender and delicate, like this new life they are building together, and they hold the promise of robust growth and bright days in the months to come. Chill and storms, dead leaves and decay will surely follow in their turn, but he can see the cycle stretching out, looping, repeating, growing stronger and more complex the longer they are here.

He doesn’t say this, precisely, to Aziraphale, but he looks up from the tiny flowers just as Aziraphale looks up too, and their eyes meet and Aziraphale nods once, quick and certain. Crowley lets go of any last shreds of unease and knows he will be happier here than anywhere else. Happy not just because Aziraphale is here (he would be happy with him anywhere), but happy in his own self, and settled — he has a project, and a purpose, one that will last as long as he needs it to. Something to love and care for in a different way than he cared for his other plants, displacing onto them his painful thwarted longing. He will love and care for these plants, that speak of tenderness and hope, while loving Aziraphale and caring for him; while Aziraphale is loving Crowley and caring for him.

He has a garden.

As the days get longer and warmer he stops tramping about the countryside finding beauty in the unbeautiful and the disregarded and works hard to help his garden flourish, to flower abundantly for Aziraphale, who delights in every bloom Crowley brings him and in the ones he doesn't pick, but only shows him — daffodils in every shade of yellow and gold, purple wisteria weeping down the walls of the cottage, shy anemones in the shade of trees, violets whose scent pervades the bedroom from a small vase by the bed.

He digs the soil, and withers the weeds that threaten to overwhelm his plants, cuts back spent blooms and watches bees buzzing drunkenly in the blossom clouding the orchard in pink and white. "Make fruit," he tells the trees, "pears for Aziraphale, plump and sweet, apples for me, cherries and plums." And soon the tiny beginnings of bounty form on the branches. 

When they first saw the house in its overgrown garden he had thought: "Plants, I do want to do something with plants." He hadn't known, then, that he would be on his knees, digging his hands into soil, grit under his fingernails, mud streaking his forehead and staining his jeans, heedless of time, eager to see each day what was new, what thrived, what was fading. But here he is, deeply content.

Aziraphale has set his books to rights, selected those he wants to share in Marjorie Care's library, packed them into boxes and delivered them to the village hall, where soon more shelves will be needed. He spends happy afternoons there, listening to what readers are looking for and what they really need, and recommending just the right book, sometimes a precious one of his own, sometimes a paperback donated by another reader. He reads these too, and discovers a taste for science fiction tales of voyaging among the stars — nothing to do with the universe he knows, but stories don’t have to be true to tell the truth. His own experiences — just in the last few years, here in England — would hardly seem possible plainly recounted, but written in a book by a clever author would tell the truth about love and choosing your side and knowing yourself and readers would feel the truth even if they didn’t believe it really happened. And who is he to say voyaging among the stars isn’t true. Perhaps there are whole other universes where such things are true. He might be æthereal but he isn’t omniscient. So much is ineffable — that is something he does know.

He’s thinking about all this, prompted by a wonderful story of sentient spaceships and the forming of new worlds, as he walks home in the early summer dusk, having refused Crowley’s offer to drive down and fetch him. Their lane is dusty, winter's mud dried. He can't help his fond smile at the way the bottoms of his trousers are dirtied by the fine powder; perhaps Crowley will indulge him again. The gate's hinges squeak as he pushes it open. Crowley is sure to be in his garden on such a fine evening, perhaps they will sit in the deck chairs with a bottle of wine. Aziraphale walks up the path, and across the lawn, round the corner of the house, and sees Crowley picking roses, cutting their thorny stems with a wicked knife.

"Thank you," Aziraphale hears him say, "He'll be so pleased," as he cuts a deep golden rose, from the same bush that bore the flower he presented to Aziraphale on their very first morning in this garden. "You've done well," Crowley continues, and dropping his voice: "better keep it up, you're his favourite."

It's true.

He doesn't look round and see Aziraphale, and Aziraphale doesn't call out a greeting, he just looks, and looks.

Crowley's hair is pulled off his face in a messy bun, and there's a streak of dirt on his cheek. He’s wearing one of Aziraphale’s pale blue shirts open over a t-shirt. He has never been more beautiful and Aziraphale knows this is how he wants to paint him — surrounded by beauty he has nurtured — in his paradise.

Crowley looks up at last. "Angel! There you are." He crosses the lawn, and holds out the roses. "We grew these for you."

"In your paradise." The scent of the many-coloured blooms, clean and fresh and somehow spicy, envelops them.

Crowley's beloved golden eyes have a saltwater shine. "In  _ our _ paradise, angel." He takes Aziraphale's hand and they stand together and watch as the first stars come out, pale at first, and then brighter, steadier, shining down on them in their paradise.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And so we leave them for now. I think they'll be happy here, with their garden and their books and their new friends.
> 
> Please come and tell me your thoughts, I love to chat to readers. <3

**Author's Note:**

> A long time ago, PyotrIljich made me a playlist of songs inspired by a series of drabbles; one of the songs was _Here is your paradise_ , which, slightly adapted, gave me the perfect title for this story.  
> Thank you, dear reader, for loving them in these stories and for sharing your thoughts so generously.


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